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16.
Jimmy Mendez had been to the store two blocks away with some older kids, but now he was scared he'd be in trouble. It was starting to be late afternoon.
He could tell, as he raced home on his bicycle, because he could smell hamburger cooking in houses as he went by. The ice cream truck came by with its jingling music rolling over the rooftops, and Jimmy could have kicked himself for the bad timing—had he been home five minutes earlier, he might have copped an ice cream.
Turning into the driveway, he swung his right leg behind his left, and stood on the left pedal as he cruised into the open garage door. Stepping off, he let the bike gently sail to rest standing up between piles of bags. He stopped and listened for signs of trouble, like mom and dad arguing about why they weren't stricter, or mom calling his name in that quavering, scared voice when he wasn't immediately nearby.
Hearing nothing out of the ordinary, he pushed open the inside door from the garage into the hallway near the kitchen. He stood still and listened. The TV was on, with a bowling game. That meant lots of laughing people, bouncy commercials, commentary from some old guy with weird hair.
Jimmy tiptoed into the house and pulled the door shut. He was about to sneak down the hall to his bedroom, at the other end of the house from mom and dad's, when he heard a noise. He froze again. It sounded like a groan or a sigh. It wasn't words—Jimmy could tell that much. It seemed to be coming from the living room at the back of the house, so he tiptoed to the doorway between the kitchen and the dining room and looked diagonally across toward the living room. Mom and dad stood there, locked in an embrace. Her back was toward Jimmy. She wore this wrinkled white blouse and dark skirt that came down to the backs of her knees. Her nylons and shoes were gone. Dad was taller than she, and her head was back while he leaned over her. Jimmy couldn't see dad's face, but he hoped it was back to normal—not the cold, distant stranger who had come ashore. Mom's arms seemed limp, as if he were really planting a long-lost-love kind of French nuke on her. Maybe things were okay after all. Grinning faintly, Jimmy turned and headed for his bedroom. His stomach was beginning to sound early, faint hunger pangs. He grabbed his softball and glove on the way.
Sometime later, the hunger pangs began. Jimmy looked up from his computer, where he'd been playing a game of chasing monsters through a castle, and shooting them with ray guns. It was noticeably darker outside. The clock on the wall, with the big easy to read numbers, said it was 5:00. Mom should be preparing dinner about now, but Jimmy couldn't smell anything. He left his bedroom and walked down the long, dark, carpeted hallway to the middle of the house. The TV was still on, but now it was billiards instead of bowling. The kitchen was as it had been when he walked through earlier. Weird. They wouldn't have gone out for pizza without him, and he would have to be babysat. That was the law. He walked around the kitchen table, noting that no dishes were on it, and the stovetop was cold. No hamburger, no potatoes, no pudding, nothing.
Jimmy headed down the long hallway to his parents' bedroom. It took forever to get there, and he lightly tossed his ball and caught it with the gloved hand, over and over.
The door was slightly ajar, and he paused. He didn't hear any noise from inside. He knew that adult moms and dads sometimes lay on the couch together and necked, or got into bed without clothes on to look at each other or something. Sometimes they made weird wailing noises, or growled at each other. It was scary, like watching people attack each other. You'd think one was going to kill the other, or eat the other. Kids at school said it was Sex. Jimmy was too embarrassed to ask what it meant.
When he pushed the door open and stood staring, he saw them lying in bed together. He smelled this icky smell, like dirt, but it had something garbagy in it. Nasty. They had their clothes on, but rumpled. They must have fallen asleep together. A fan was on. Distant TV talk about billiards made it hard to hear if they were breathing. He didn't want to look closer.
He went back to the kitchen to fix some ice cream and cookies. Maybe drink a glass of chocolate milk. He found ice cream, and potato chips, and cola, and peanut butter. He climbed up and got some cookies from the jar on top of the refrigerator. Almost fell down and broke his neck in the process. Finally, when he was ready to eat, the ice cream was starting to melt, so he said "Oops!" and quickly took the carton back to the freezer. Should have thought of that. A puddle of chocolate was on the table. Now I'm in for it. Hearing a sound from the dining room, he paused and listened with his heart racing. If mom saw the mess, she would yell, and that would make dad take down the ping pong paddle.
No further sounds. Jimmy got a sponge, filled it with warm water, and started to mop up the mess. All the water from the sponge leaked out and made twice as much of a mess. Finally, he used a whole roll of paper towels to sop it up. He took the whole armload of wet towels outside to the trash can. Then he realized his shirt was now covered with chocolate, so he took it off. The neighborhood girl, who was eight, made a nasty sound and stuck her tongue out, imitating his physique. He stuck his tongue out at her and hurried into the house. Were mom and dad still sleeping? It was so quiet in here.
He walked down the long hallway again. "Mom?" His voice sounded thin and quavering in his ears. It sounded like someone else's voice. He wasn't ready to call out "Dad?" yet. Something made him shy away from that. He wasn't sure yet if that man was really his dad. "Mommy?" he said in a frightened little voice.
The smell in the bedroom was stronger now. It reminded Jimmy of mushroom soup, but stale somehow, almost rotten. He started to gag. He just glimpsed both of them, still in their embrace, only they weren't on the bed anymore. Mom lay pressed against the baseboard, and dad had his arms around her and his face over hers. He had his back to Jimmy, and Jimmy couldn't see either of their faces, but he knew something was terrifyingly wrong here. They didn't seem to be moving, and he didn't see dad's shirt moving up and down with breathing. A glossy black hose ran from Dad's mouth out into Mom's neck, and Dad's cheeks were slightly puffed out as if he were blowing something into her—something, industrial, sharp, mushroomy.
Jimmy didn't have the time or the courage to go in and find out more, because barf came up and ran between his fingers as he cupped his hands over his mouth. In the gloom, he could make out that it was mushroom-colored barf, sort of clay colored. He ran down the hall, crying and barfing at the same time, with that awful mushroom smell rising up into his sinuses and choking him. He just made it to the bathroom and stood on his box under the sink, when the whole ice cream, cookies, everything he'd eaten, plus the orange juice and chocolate milk, jumped up out of his throat and splashed the sink. Just seeing it made him barf all the more, and he started crying inbetween barfing, crying for mommy to come help him, but she didn't, and he was afraid to go down that hallway again.
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